I am an evil giraffe. Who no longer blogs about politics.

President Barack Obama spent the last year insisting he doesn’t want to turn the American health care system into a carbon copy of the government-run British system.

But Obama’s pick to run Medicaid and Medicare — Donald Berwick — is a pediatrician and Harvard University professor with a self-professed “love” of the British system.

Berwick has called Britain’s National Health Service “one of the greatest health care institutions in human history” and “a global treasure.” He once said it sets an “example” for the United States to follow. And his decadelong efforts to improve the NHS were so well-regarded that Queen Elizabeth granted him an honorary knighthood in 2005.

And given the way that the public hates Obamacare, this should be one heck of a confirmation hearing. not just because of Sir Donald’s history of wanting to explicitly use ‘health care reform’ as a tool for wealth redistribution, but because he’s so supportive of a British health care system that’s frankly awful. I look forward to that discussion. I look forward to putting Sir Donald under the glare of television cameras and inviting him to explain why he loves a system that is actively importing foreign doctors to cover a shortfall of general practitioners – something that we’re going to be facing ourselves, soon. I look forward to seeing Sir Donald explain why the NHS is bragging that they’ve reduced the waiting time for in-and-out hospital stays to a mere nine weeks. And I look forward to hearing Sir Donald wax lyrical on the virtues of the NHS’ redistributing wealth – not that this would include the NHS’ own head, who makes twice as much as the UK Prime Minister.

So yeah. Let’s go, Sir Donald.

Moe Lane

PS: You pay your taxes? – Sorry, but that’s a pro forma question that we’re asking all Democratic nominees these days. And you’d be amazed how often the answer is ‘No.’